“There are other intoxicants that are far worse that we do not treat the same way. We do not accuse people of criminal offenses for consuming,” Leach said at a Harrisburg press conference Monday afternoon as he introduced a bill to legalize pot.

Leach argues marijuana is safer that other legal drugs.

“Marijuana is not physically addictive,” he said. “Alcohol and tobacco are physically addictive.”

I don’t know about the addictive part, but we already know tobacco and alcohol are. So what’s the difference?

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2 Responses to Bill would legalize pot in PA

In the strict medical sense, marijuana is not physically addictive. It doesn’t cause the types of long term changes in neurotransmitter production that lead to physical withdrawal symtoms, such as you get with nicotine and alcohol.

That doesn’t stop it from causing permanent neurological changes when heavily used by people whose brains are still developing. That means adolescents as well as kids. And heavy use at any age can cause what the scientists call “loss of executive function” and what everyone else calls being a pothead.

Short form: marijuana isn’t necessarily harmless, but it’s way way way less harmful than alcohol. (If it’s smoked, I’m not sure how much less harmful than cigarettes it would turn out to be, at similar levels of consumption. Smoke just wan’t meant to be inhaled.)

This is becoming kind of interesting as more and more states start the legalization process. Now bills are being developed in Congress to get Feds to go along. While I’m ecstatic at the changes, I sure wouldn’t have predicted that the US would elect a black president, legalized gay marriage, and be positively scrambling to legalize pot in what’s realistically been only the last 4 years. Especially one after the other in quick succession. Is this what ‘they’ mean by a ‘sea change’ in American culture?